Emir Muhammadu Sanusi II is the Emir of Kano. He was crowned 8 June 2014, succeeding his late grand uncle Dr Ado Bayero (who died on Friday 6 June 2014). Malam Sanusi was a successful banker and was a former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria. He was appointed on 3 June 2009 for a five-year term, but was suspended from office by President Goodluck Jonathan on 20 February 2014 after exposing a $20 billion fraud committed by the government.
Background
Emir Muhammadu Sanusi II was born as Sanusi Lamido Sanusi (Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi) into the Fulani Torobe (Sullubawa) clan of Kano on the July 31 1961. He is the grandson of Sir Muhammadu Sunusi, the 11th Emir of Kano, from the Sullubawa clan of the Torobe Fulani. He is the direct son of Muhammad Lamido Sanusi, a career diplomat and technocrat that served as the Nigerian Ambassador to Belgium, China and Canada, who later served as the Permanent Secretary of Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Education
Sanusi Lamido had his primary education at the St. Anne’s Catholic Primary School, Kakuri, Kaduna between the years 1967-1972, where he obtained his First School Leaving Certificate. Lamido Sanusi had his secondary education at King's College Lagos, where he graduated in 1977. He got admission into Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) Zaria, where he obtained a Bachelors degree in Economics in 1981. He furthered his studies and obtained a Masters degree in Economics at Ahmadu Bello University in 1983, and became an instructor there from 1983 until 1985. Sanusi also studied in the International University of Africa, Khartoum, Sudan, where he obtained a degree in Islamic Law. Sanusi was posted to Gongola State (now Adamawa and Taraba States) where he did his National Youth Service Corpse (NYSC) mandatory service.
In 1985 Sanusi got employed by the Icon Limited (Merchant Bankers), a subsidiary of Morgan Guaranty Trust Bank of New York United States, and Baring Brothers of London. He later joined the United Bank for Africa in 1997, working at the bank’s Credit and Risk Management Division, he rose to the position of a General Manager. In September 2005, he became one of the Board members of First Bank of Nigeria as an Executive Director in charge of Risk and Management Control. Later he was appointed Group Managing Director (CEO) in January 2009. Almost at the same period, Sanusi was also the Chairman, Kakawa Discount House, where he sat on the Board of FBN Bank (UK) Limited.
Sanusi was the first person from the northern Nigeria to be appointed CEO in the history of First Bank in Nigeria.
On June 1, 2009, during the regime of President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua, Sanusi was nominated as Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria and his appointment was confirmed by the Nigerian Senate on June 3, 2009 at the height of the a global financial crisis.
On June 8, 2014, Sanusi was selected to succeed his great uncle Ado Bayero as the Emir of Kano. Many people had expected Ado Bayero's son to succeed him as Emir, this led the supporters of Bayero's son to angrily protest Sanusi's appointment. On june 9, 2014, he was formally crowned as Emir Muhammadu Sunusi II, making him the 14th Emir of Kano and the leader of the Tijaniyya Sufi order, a position that is historically the second most important Muslim position in Nigeria after the Sultan of Sokoto who is the leader of the Qadiriyya sufi order.
Achievements
Works
publication
Managing Credit Risk Under Basel 2
2004
The New Capital Accord (Basel 2): challenges, opportunities and threats
2004
The New Capital Accord (Basel 2): The standardized Approach to minimum Capital Requirements Under the first Pillar
2004
Bank lending: Approval Administration & Control
2004
Religion
In parallel to his banking career, Sanusi contributed to the debate over Sharia law. In 1997, Sanusi obtained a degree in Sharia and Islamic Studies from the African International University in Khartoum, Sudan. Writing in the Weekly Trust in September 2000, he noted the problem of reconciling "belief in the universal and eternal applicability of the Shariah with the need for a wholesale adoption of its historically specific interpretation to meet the requirements of a particular milieu." He further said that "Even a cursory student of Islamic history knows that all the trappings of gender inequality present in the Muslim society have socio-economic and cultural, as opposed to religious roots.
At a conference in 2000 in Kaduna, Sanusi delivered a lecture on Islamic economics called Institutional Framework of Zakat: Dimension and Implications. He argued that although collection of zakat is the responsibility of the state, it may be the responsibility of the Nigerian government rather than the emirs in Northern Nigeria. In July 2001 at a seminar in Abuja he talked on Basic Needs and Redistributive Justice in Islam – The Panacea to Poverty in Nigeria. He took the mainstream position that zakat is an instrument for redistributing income, but argued in favor of giving the role of redistribution to the government.
In October 2002 he published a paper on The Hudhood Punishments in Northern Nigeria: A Muslim Criticism. In July 2003 he presented The Shari'a Debate and the Construction of a 'Muslim' Identity in Northern Nigeria: A Critical Perspective at a seminar at the University of Bayreuth. In August 2003 he presented Democracy, Rights and Islam: Theory, Epistemology and the Quest for Synthesis at an international conference on Shari'ah Penal and Family Law in Nigeria and in the Muslim World: A Rights-Based Approach in Abuja.
There are two underlying themes to Sanusi's position. First, Islam is concerned with delivering justice and should not be a tool for self-seeking political agendas. Second, the Wahhabist rhetoric of fundamentalists is counter to genuine Muslim interests. He explains that Sharia is not divine but merely religious, and is neither uniform nor unchanging
Politics
During the end of his tenure as the Governor of Central bank of Nigeria, he was a critic of the then Goodluk administration. Nigeria lost a billion dollars a month to diversion of funds under the government of Goodluck Jonathan, according to a 2013 TED talk by Sanusi.
The PBS segment quoted American and British officials saying that former Petroleum Minister Diezani Alison-Madueke might personally have organized a diversion of $6 billion (N1.2 trillion) from the Nigerian treasury. She was arrested in London on October 2, 2015.
Sanusi believes he was fired from the Central Bank of Nigeria because he went public with charges that $20 billion was missing from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) under Alison-Madueke's management. Alison Madueke says Sanusi made the allegations to retaliate after she didn’t help him to get appointed as the president of the African Development Bank (AfDB) and dismissed his allegation.
He cites the high level of corruption engendered by the practice, the inefficiency of subsidizing consumption instead of production leading to slower economic growth, and the fact that the government borrows money to finance the subsidy, in effect taxing future generations so that current Nigerians can consume more fuel.
Sanusi, other economists and development practitioners also cite that the subsidy is heavily biased in favor of the small middle- and upper-class who use most of the fuel. Additionally, some people purchase the subsidized gas in Nigeria to resell it in other West African countries.
Views
Quotations:
"Nigeria is not an oil rich country. We are an oil producing country."
"The task of the intellectual is not one of blending into the opaque consciousness of the tumultuous mob around him, his voice drowned in a cacophony of misdirected protests. His task is to remind them of who they are and what they ought to be. Our values are not to be taken from conduct of our adversaries but from the great heritage of our people."
Personality
He is a social and outspoken man.
Quotes from others about the person
Ibrahim Mu’azu: “The central bank may look into what he is saying.”
Mallam Sanusi has been conferred with a National Award of Commander of the Order of the Niger (CON), by the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and also been awarded the “Global Central Bank Governor for 2010” by The Banker Magazine – a publication of the Financial Times.
Mallam Sanusi has been conferred with a National Award of Commander of the Order of the Niger (CON), by the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and also been awarded the “Global Central Bank Governor for 2010” by The Banker Magazine – a publication of the Financial Times.